Strangely, a lookalike of a music hit is nothing like the original, and it’s worth analyzing!
- Music is a vehicle for a common experience. Everyone knows the next notes of some Lady Gaga song. We feel like learning the lyrics will make us able to sing together if we were in a club, and share something with other clubbers. Any AI who would reproduce the voice and instruments would still not make you feel like you are sharing a common moment with the rest of the auditors,
- Hits are hits because we hear them a thousand times. It’s been proven that people don’t necessarily like it the first time. It’s the familiarity with the song which make us like it (or hate it when we’ve heard to too much).
- Even worse: We like some songs even more because we love the author. Be it because they are politically involved, have a cute face, has a nice life story, or seem to hide answers to life in the lyrics of their work - But an AI producing the same exact notes wouldn’t trigger similar affection from us. It’s like hearing our kid singing: Very cute, but we wouldn’t like the same song by another kid. Audiences have a genuine emotional attachment to the authors. It’s especially visible since the MCM revolution: Before MCM, music mattered; Now the image matters way more, bands have a face, a graphic style, a story to tell - and music could be as crap as possible, if we like the band it can still have success. MCM changed music forever, proving that AI can’t replace that feeling.
I hear a lot of stated assumptions on how certain things trigger emotional investment and other don’t.
If you knew how manufactured the music industry was, and how nothing of what you see of celebrities is true, it might as well be AI plucking our heart strings, because it isn’t “real” in the sense that I think you mean, authentic human connection over shared experience.
